One of our coalition members — Defending Dissent Foundation — is among the main sponsors of an important event drawing attention to and protesting the increasing criminalization of dissent in the wake of Holder v. Humanitarian Law Project, the September 24 FBI raids, and the metastasizing efforts by the U.S. government to quash Wikileaks.

These are at bottom matters of free speech, freedom of association, a free press, and, in the case of Bradley Manning, freedom from the cruelty and deeply inhumane torture of solitary confinement.

Here is the announcement:

Celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day in a way that would make the great man proud. Martin will be with us on the street. Presente!

Defend Free Speech and the Right to Organize! Opposing War and Occupation is not a crime!

1 p.m.: Convoy to Quantico
We’ll take off from the centre of the American police state in a caravan to Marine Corps Base Quantico where military authorities are holding our brother Bradley Manning in an inhumane condition of solitary confinement. (MCB Quantico is 45 minutes south of DC)